Hillary Clinton is a bigot? The art of the reverse attack - CNN

[Native]

Hillary Clinton? A bigot? That makes no sense. It's absurd. Hillary Clinton has spent much of her career working to improve race relations. She is the furthest thing imaginable from a bigot. So what in the world is Trump doing here?

Trump is employing the technique of the reverse attack. When he is faced with a legitimate criticism of himself, he attempts to deflect away the criticism by attacking Clinton for the exact same shortcoming that plagues Trump, regardless of whether it actually applies to Clinton.

He's used this tactic when accused of being racist, mentally unfit, a bully, lacking the qualifications to be president, and so on. When he's confronted with any of these issues, he accuses Hillary of being the one with the problem, not him.

...it certainly is not the best way to overcome a criticism. An ideal response would be to clearly show that the criticism is inaccurate, say, by listing specific qualifications to be president. But when there are no good responses to a criticism, the reverse attack comes into play.

The objective is to create confusion. The bigger the mess, the better. This way, the focus of attention shifts away from the devastating criticism because everyone becomes caught up in the food-fight. This is Trump's playbook. He is the circus ringmaster who creates all sorts of spectacles to divert attention away from his own disqualifying inadequacies.

It seems ridiculous, but the food-fight tactic has obviously been very effective for him. Thank you media for aiding and abetting!

http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/28/opinions/trumps-reverse-attack-on-clinton-cain/index.html

[uppityperson]

1. The best way to respond is with laughter.

[Native]

3. Remember when CNN live fact-checked Trump for one whole day?

I realize that's asking the network to actually put some effort into their broadcasts, and I'm not exactly asking them to do anything crazy like investigative journalism, but whenever Trump or a surrogate starts the food-fight, why can't they simply put up a scrolling ticker that says: REVERSE ATTACK: used to deflect legitimate criticisms of oneself.

[Arkansas Granny]

2. One of the Sunday morning pundits this morning (I don't recall which one) opined

that the candidates had started mud slinging this week. It's like they have ignored Trump's nasty remarks over the past months, but when Hillary calls Trump out for his horrible statements, it's mud slinging.

I'm so glad there's no media bias.

[wysi]

4. It's not art, in this case

It's the political equivalent of a chimp throwing feces.

[Native]

5. +1

[Orsino]

6. "Employing"? "Technique"? "Art"?

He's just bullshitting. If we need a fancy word for it, it's nothing more than projection.